1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to an apparatus for cooking eggs, and more particularly to a rapid cooking apparatus for combination with an egg frying utensil and to a method of cooking therewith.
2. Prior Art
In general, cooking processes may be characterized by the terms poaching, boiling, steaming, frying, broiling and baking. Poaching is herein defined as cooking the foodstuff in water or other liquid near the liquid's boiling point; boiling is a type of poaching wherein the foodstuff is cooked at the liquid's boiling point;/steaming as cooking the foodstuff with or exposed to the action of steam; frying as cooking the foodstuff in a pan or griddle over direct heat, sometimes including hot fat; broiling as cooking the foodstuff by exposure to direct flame or intense heat; and baking as cooking the foodstuff by dry heat.
Eggs are normally cooked by being poached, boiled (in their shells), steamed or fried. Since eggs are easily scorched by the application of too much heat, and scorched eggs result in a generally disliked taste and appearance, broiling is usually considered an unacceptable process of egg cooking due to the high heat; whereas, although rapid, frying may be carefully controlled to prevent over browning. Poaching, boiling or steaming eggs provides a visually attractive cooked egg, with a slightly different flavor than fried egg, but the poaching and boiling processes are not readily adaptable to large scale operations, and the steaming process tends to yield a somewhat rubbery texture. Baking eggs has usually been reserved for home prepared, specialty egg dishes requiring moisture during the cooking process.
The rise of the fast-food industry in recent years has created food preparations and cooking needs which differ not only from home food preparation and cooking, but also differ from many of the previous restaurant and institutional cooking apparatus and methods therewith.
For example, the fast-food industry requires that many of its cooked foods not be separated for serving from one large, cooked batch, but rather that many of such foods have each been, as an individual serving, separately and rapidly cooked, assembled with condiments or additional foods, packaged and, if necessary, kept warm until sold. That is, among the most important considerations in the fast-food industry are individualization of servings, rapid cooking of the individual servings, and close consistency in taste appearance and degree of doneness between the servings.
When a large number of discrete eggs are to be cooked, such as in restaurant operations, frying upon a griddle is the preferred cooking process due to the rigid cooking of the egg, and the adaptability to large scale cooking operations. Further, the desire that cooked eggs be consistent in the degree of cooking, and in appearance, which is particularly true in a fast-food industry, mitigates against the practice of turning the eggs during cooking since egg yolks frequently break during turning; yet without turning, eggs take a longer period of time to fry.
Prior to the rapid cooking apparatus and method of the present invention, consistently and thoroughly cooked eggs (having an egg yolk which does not substantially run when the yolk membrane is pierced) by the process of frying the eggs upon a griddle have been obtained by use of a cooking utensil known to the art which includes a handle and a plurality of egg confining tubes. The tubes rest upon a heated griddle and provide consistently shaped and substantially thoroughly cooked eggs, although the thorough cooking generally requires a cooking time of about four minutes. The rate of cooking eggs within such a utensil may be somewhat decreased by raising the griddle temperature; however, the achievable rate decrease is not great and is further limited by the fact that too high a griddle temperature will result in overly browned cooked eggs and even in extreme cases scorched eggs as well as possible sticking of the eggs to the griddle.
A variety of frying utensils which disclose thoroughly cooking eggs without the necessity of turning the eggs during the cooking process and thus decrease the time of cooking are known to the art; among these are the teaching of U.S. Pat. No. 3,596,590 and the teaching of U.S. Pat. No. 608,144.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,596,590 discloses an apparatus which permits the passage of liquid into the vicinity of an egg which is cooking upon a skillet or grill whereby the liquid contacts the skillet or grill, turns into steam, and the egg upper surface is thus cooked by the steam (steamed) while the lower surface is cooked by frying. This steaming apparatus is awkward where a larger quantity of eggs are to be cooked and is thus not really adaptable to high volume fast food operation.
U.S. Pat. No. 608,144 discloses an apparatus wherein an egg is cooked by frying the egg bottom in a skillet and by frying the egg top through means of hot, liquid fat overflowed thereupon. The apparatus includes a cover for preventing fat spattering during the frying process. This frying apparatus is not suitable where a relatively non-greasy, non-browned cooked egg is desirable and is also not really adaptable to high volume fast-food operation.